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The Spirit That Moves The Packers

THIS Green Bay Packers' locker room is a fascinating subculture and a microcosm. A place in so many ways more diverse than the city itself, yet in so many ways still segregated: Northerners and Southerners. Blacks and whites. Young players and seasoned veterans.

A group of white players sits at one large, green table playing backgammon and dominoes; black players sit at another green table a few feet away playing dominoes. But the sharpest distinction is between the devout and not-so devout, a difference that manifests itself through music, or rather control of the music: specifically, who controls the stereo.

This is a humorous but serious tug of war that is generational, territorial and so deeply ingrained in the Packers' weekly ritual. ''Invariably,'' said Sean Jones, the veteran defensive end, ''there's going to be a fight between gospel music, with Reggie, and Wayne Simmons and his hip hop and gangsta music. A fight breaks out every week about that.''

Everyone focuses on Reggie White's impact on Green Bay as a player, possibly the best defensive lineman in the history of professional football. But it is White's presence in the locker room and these scrappy fights over secular versus spiritual that have provided the tension that, in many ways, has helped bridge barriers, fused generations and cultures, and propelled the Packers.

White and Simmons came to the Packers the same year, 1993. White, an ordained minister since his college days at the University of Tennessee, is 35 and in his 12th season at defensive end. Simmons, 27, is in his fourth season as a linebacker from Clemson. White insists on playing gospel music and dislikes the gangsta rap that Simmons and many of the team's younger players enjoy. But how they have achieved the mix goes a long way in explaining how Green Bay has endured frustrating growing pains and moved one game short of its first Super Bowl appearance in 30 years.

When he first arrived, White would simply take off the offensive music and put on gospel. ''It depends how mad Reggie is,'' said Jones. ''I've heard everything from a whole hour of gospel to when Reggie wants to cut it off. So what we've come to is that most guys just wear headphones now.''

Simmons does not wear headphones. He broke down the generational wall. ''When it gets a little boring, I'm the only one who pretty much would say something to Reggie,'' he said.

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''I come in the locker room, I'm like, 'How long has this been on?' The guys say, 'It's been on all day.' I say, 'We got to change it. Reggie, we got to change it.' He says, 'You're not gonna change it.' I say, 'Yes we are. We're going to take a vote, and we're voting you out.' ''

White said that he has been more tolerant. ''I don't try to be a bully, maybe sometimes they think I'm trying to be a bully,'' White said. ''Sometimes we play our gospel music and they say, 'We don't want to hear that music,' and I say 'Naw, you're going to hear that music'. ''

I should point out that both players laughed as they told their versions of the tug of war. Both are passionate about the music and the themes underlying the music. Somehow, it all works. ''There's no hostility,'' Simmons said. ''We have respect for everybody in this room. We don't play anything that's raunchy, we don't play anything that's explicit. We just play good music. We wouldn't do him like that.''

Largely because of White, the Packers, as a team, have been sensitized not only to religion but also to race and culture. This time last season, White was reeling from an act of terrorism and arson that left his Inner City Community Church in Knoxville, Tenn., burned to the ground. White spoke loudly about the incident and said it drained his desire to play football. A week after the burning, Green Bay lost the conference championship game to Dallas. White received financial and emotional support from around the country; about $230,000 was raised, mostly from Packer fans in Wisconsin. White was so moved that as he tearfully accepted a donation he vowed to reward Green Bay with a Super Bowl trophy.

''When my church burned, it showed me that God is calling me to have an impact, to rally people from different ethnic backgrounds,'' White said.

Force and understanding. A healthy coexistence between North and South, black and white, devout and not devout. They all play football; they all are human. And for now, they are all Green Bay Packers.